Minsk Resident With Pneumonia: Seeing Man Being Taken Away In Capsule Is Really Scary

What is going on at the Republican Center of Pulmonology?

A resident of Minsk, Mariyja, who is now in the Republican Center of Pulmonology and Physiology with pneumonia, has told the press service of the European Belarus civil campaign about why Belarusians should take their health seriously and why the quarantine is important:

- About two weeks ago, I felt bad. I had a bad headache. I spent three days at home, and then I started going to work again thinking it was an ARVI. I was on the usual medications that most people take when they have a cold. At the same time, I had a small temperature of 37-37.2, a decline in strength, constant apathy. Then I felt somehow relieved, and when the temperature was rising to 37, I attributed it to that, perhaps, the tea was hot. After I felt a little relieved, I started coughing. The coughing started to increase and intensify. Of course, there were fits of coughing not every ten minutes, but too tangible. And I got suspicious, let's just say.

I had been to Egypt, but I had been there more than a month before, I thought the incubation period was over. To be on the safe side, I called my polyclinic, because the first cases of coronavirus infection had already taken place in Belarus. I called to the policlinic, wanted to ask how I could pass the test, but the policlinic said that if there was no high temperature, there was no reason for taking the test. Also, the policlinic asked who I'd been in contact with. After my answers they said: "It's been a long time, there's no reason to worry. Accordingly, I continued to go to work with a cough and a fever of about 37.

One day, I decided to call a private medical center near my work and ask if I could have an X-ray taken there. I made an appointment, and came for an X-ray. The doctor from the medical center, who saw the X-ray, told me to go to my polyclinic immediately, because I had left-side pneumonia. So on March 31, I found myself in the Republican Scientific and Practical center in the pulmonology department.

At the moment I don't know the result of my test for Covid-2019, so the people I worked with have not been isolated. And I have a large collective, thousands of people come, because I work in one of the largest shopping centers in Minsk.

I want to say that the conditions in RSPC are good, we have a good doctor. People who suffer from pneumonia have been brought here, and there are no assumptions about coronavirus, because doctors apparently believe that the patient with Covid-19 must have high temperature and double pneumonia.

We had a case today, when the coronavirus was not confirmed, but the patient was urgently isolated in a contagious isolation ward. So it's hard for me to understand what's going on here. After that case, when the man was taken, we were banned from leaving our wards. We used to be allowed to get groceries in the hallway, wearing masks, of course, now we're not.

You know, I think our people have a problem with light-mindedness. Those who didn't see the man being taken out in the capsule, they don't take the situation that seriously. And those who did, believe me, are scared. I was just "lucky" to see it, because they were transporting him along the side of my ward, and our windows look out to where the ambulance arrived. I wouldn't want anyone to find himself in this person's shoes.

While I'm waiting for my coronavirus test results, I'm very worried, there's an anxiety. If the test is positive, then how many people I could have infected, I think about it. I try not to lose spirit, I soothe myself by the fact that I am Belarusian, and we, Belarusians, as you know, will survive everything. There is no panic, there is concern for others.

I also want to note that first of all, one should do tests, and then place the people in the wards. All those who stay in the Republican Scientific and Practical Center have the following idea: "what if the neighbor is infected?"